


Green Eyes on the Rise

by Tinq



Category: Supernatural
Genre: AU, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Angst, Family, Fluff, Guitarist!Dean, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, artist!Cas, flash backs, lawyer!Sam
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-08-15
Updated: 2014-08-14
Packaged: 2018-02-13 05:29:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,603
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2138742
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tinq/pseuds/Tinq
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After a troubling attempt at a Christmas dinner, Castiel Novak finds himself falling asleep in his new apartment in New York with one thought on his mind - get a job. But when Cas is woken up in the night, he meets a rugged, leather-jacket bearing guitarist willing to help Cas along, even if it means their pasts colliding and their futures changing.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Green Eyes on the Rise

Castiel was tired. Too tired to care that he still had his jeans on when he fell in bed, and too tired to turn the lamp beside his bed off - so tired, in fact, that the light didn't bother him at all. But not tired enough to fall in bed without shrugging off his trench coat, which fell to the floor in a small pile as he sat down on top of the heavy duvet comforter.

 

He had to admit, this was not exactly the place he had imagined spending Christmas. Though he had been dreading the event, for the past few months Cas had been expecting to be back at his families house, where he would attempt to ‘reconnect’ with everyone. As if Castiel needed that - he had enough on his plate, with being let go from his job as a barista in Philly two weeks back and deciding to withhold such information from his family.

 

Upon arriving at the huge estate the Novak family had been living on for years, Cas had actually, if you can believe it, smiled. Not necessarily at his parents - but Gabriel opened the door and swept his younger brother into a bear hug so tight Cas could hardly breathe.

 

“Little bro!” The short, hardly plump, man had shouted, releasing Cas after a moment. “Good to see ya, man!” And then he took Castiel’s peace offering of burnt cookies and yanked his brother into the kitchen, where he was crowded by the rest of his family, whose interest’s were as fleeting as his brother’s had been.

 

Two hours, a near kitchen fire, and a heated argument between Michael and Lucy later, and Cas found himself sitting out in the backyard with Anna, sitting in the grass a little higher than the creek they used to play in when they were children.

 

Anna let out a snort. “I suppose this was never going to go well in the first place.”

 

Cas simply shrugged. “This outcome is better than last year’s. Do you remember what transpired between Balthazar and Michael?” The black haired man just shuddered at the memory - the one in which Balthazar announced he had been invited down to Miami with his new boyfriend. Anna had been thrilled for him, Cas had been indifferent, having kept in touch with Balthazar without his families knowledge and having quite the background on his many eccentric boyfriends, and Gabriel used several sexual innuendos that did not go unheard by their parents.

 

Michael, though. Sometimes Cas couldn't tell if Michael just had a bad opinion about just about everything, or the man felt the need to be the odd one out, the one with the unique opinion, no matter whether or not it qualified him as a bad person or not. That didn't matter at all to Michael, which contrasted drastically against Lucy’s personality of trying to convince other’s of her often outlandish, but commonly correct, if not exotic, opinions.

 

But Michael had scowled deeply at Balthazar, and another moment later the two were on their feet, red in the face, in a shouting match that had Lucy seething, Cas rolling his eyes, Anna’s misty eyes trained on the floor, and Gabriel someplace else doing something - or, quite possibly considering the nature of his brother, someone - else. Soon enough their parents were brought into the argument and, long story short, the event had ended.

 

But as Cas sat out at the creek with Anna, a sudden thought came to mind, one that he actually thought quite often but never really acknowledge until now “Do you think it will always be this way? Putting all of our effort into greeting one another after another year apart, only to depart on such sour notes?”

 

“Cas,” Anna pulled his brother closer so that she could lean on his shoulder. “That’s just family, you know? We try. It’s the effort that goes into it, not the outcome.”

 

And Cas had nodded even though he still remained bitter - especially considering he heard another deep-throated tell coming from the house behind them. He stayed for another hour, before the constant remarks and snark, especially between Lucy and their father, became too much.

 

But of course, the one year Cas really, truly does not wish for it, he gets it - a truly white Christmas. Or, that is, a white Christmas Eve that moves slowly and surely into Christmas. Because somehow he’s still stuck in traffic at about one in the morning, moving inch by inch towards New York. He had a new apartment waiting for him in the downtown. It was quiet, rusty, and quite run down, but Cas had already seen the room and fallen in love with the quaintness of it. So, if he could even get from Philly to New York before sunrise, this would be his first night there.

 

Which brings Cas back to where he currently was - sitting tiredly on the seat of his bed, hardly able to keep his eyes open has he toed his shoes off and onto the floor, landing with a thud next to his trench coat, the one he never truly went in public without.

 

The apartment was nice, just as Cas remembered it to be - creme walls that seemed gold in the light of his bedside lamp, tucked into the corner up against a window that faced the street. Soft, brown hardwood floors that had a pleasant clicking sound when walked on, a medium sized TV hung up on the wall, and a bathroom adjacent to the small kitchenette that came with a nice set of burners and rectangle table that would hold his many empty cartons of Chinese just fine.

 

As Castiel sank back onto his blankets, the light blue comforter with matching grey pillows, he could already feel himself sinking into sleep. His eyes shut and soon enough the curtain closed on 3 AM for Castiel Novak.

 

—

 

 

But of course, this was Castiel Novak - how often did he get the lions share of anything at all? So another hour of wrecked sleep later, with many awkward angles and several moments where it felt as if he had woken up entirely, he felt his eyes snap open open. He smelled nothing. Saw nothing - not that he could, really, not with his sleep darkened his eyes suddenly filled with light. He shut his eyes and hissed, positive one of his siblings would have immediately made a joke about vampires, and fought to at least sit up straight.

 

It was instead that his ears were suddenly filled with - what was that? Strumming? This early in the song? Really? Cas let out an unearthly growl - those often learned exactly where they stood when they interrupted the much needed sleep of Castiel, not that he had ever gotten much from the start.

 

But it was, in fact, strumming, and annoyance pierced at Castiel when he tried to stand up and realized he was still in the same outfit as, apparently, only an hour before. He stripped off his jeans, favoring a pair of dark blue sweat pants instead, and changed into an old Metallica T-Shirt that might have been Lucy’s when she had been going through her rebellious. There was an awful change in Cas’ mouth and the strumming wouldn't stop, so groggily he stumbled over to his door and swung it open, almost blinded by the blast of light emanating from the hall, far brighter than the dim bedside lamp that was still switched on.

 

Making sure the door was unlocked behind him, and doing what he could not slam it shut in frustration - of the moment, of his family, of the fact that he was not sleeping at god-knows-what-in-the-morning - and crept down the right of the hallway until he reached the dead end. The sound quieted slightly, which Cas took as a good sign - until he made his way back towards his room and the strumming went right back to previous volume, unique patterns, each as annoying and loud as the last.

 

Cursing under his breath, Cas knew that it was probably only his luck that they lived upstairs - and so, in bare feet and cotton pajama’s, he clambered up the steps, still squinting, unable to adjust to the sudden bursts and dims of lights. To his dismay, the sound grew far quieter when he went up the stairs. Cas scrunched his nose, turning around in a circle, trying to pinpoint what direction it was coming from.

 

Shaking his head as a last effort, Castiel made his way back down the steps and to the green carpeted hallway he lived on. One more place to try, however unlikely. Cas moved straight through the front hallway until he met the two front doors, that let out to a rather large porch and several steps down onto the road. Cas pushed it open, entirely unprepared for the sudden burst of light coming from the porch lanterns hanging on either side of the double doors.

 

Holding the door open with his hip, Cas rubbed at his eyes with two fists. “Shut the hell up.” He croaked groggily, knowing fully well that if whoever was strumming at such an ungodly hour wasn't outside then he was talking to himself - but open pulling his hands away from his face and adjusting to the light, he found himself faced with a pair of devilishly green eyes, paired alongside a sheepish smile.

 

“My bad.” The man who was sitting on the porch steps, guitar in lap, breathed. The small smile soon spread to a grin when Cas didn't respond - he stood up, marching over to the door and holding out a hand for Castiel. “I’m Dean. Dean Winchester.”

 

Cas nodded, doing all he could not to swallow his tongue. “Castiel… Novak. My name’s Castiel.” The words flew out of his mouth before he could stop them, and he found his clammy hand meet with Dean’s before he could prevent anything from happening. Dean’s hand was warm, calloused, maybe a little sweaty, and Cas was sure his was sweating like a pig.

 

Dean nodded. “Well, hi, Castiel. Sorry if I woke you up - I didn't think anyone could hear me. You new?”

 

It took Cas a moment to respond and, of course, once he did the words came out in pathetic stutters. “I-I, yeah.” He flew a finger towards the wall behind him, blindly pointing towards the first window on the left and instead hitting his finger on the concrete wall.

 

Dean laughed, a beautiful sound, soft and loud at the same time, reserved but bubbly in the way that his nose crinkled and his body moved with the action. “Well, welcome to the family, Cas. Mind if I call you Cas?” To that, Cas shook his head dumbly. “Most people can’t hear me when I play, ‘specially this late. I can stop, if you’d like, I didn't think it was loud enough to-”

 

“No!” Cas said, maybe a little too loud. “No, it’s fine. You’re… you’re good. At that. The guitar, I mean.” Cas mentally pressed his palm into his forehead.

 

A light blush crept on Dean’s cheeks, a reaction so adorable, and yet so without embarrassment, that Cas found himself smiling, too, in the awkward situation. “Aw, thanks, Cas, that’s nice of you.”

 

And Castiel didn't have a good answer to Dean’s comment and found himself accidentally staring into those candy apple green eyes until Dean had the good nature to clear his throat, causing Cas to start. “I… you… I’m gonna go inside. You… um… bye.”

 

Cas turned to go, and his blood nearly ran cold when he found a warm hand wrap around his wrist, accompanied by a grin and a happy voice saying, “No need to leave yet, Cas! I can play for you.” As soon as the words were out of Dean’s mouth, he faltered a bit, cocky smile not reaching his eyes. “I mean - if you want to. It’s cool if you wanna sleep, I get that.” He ended the sentence on a chuckle that sounded so fake and hurt that there was no way in hell that Cas could ever refuse, even if he wanted to.

 

“That - that sounds nice.”

 

So Dean released Cas’ wrist, the feeling of being held onto so tightly still there on the shy man’s skin, and sat back down on the porch, guitar in lap. Cas sat down next to him awkwardly, trying to sit comfortably until he found himself leaning on the rail opposite of Dean.

 

The green eyed guitarist sighed, contentedly. “So, Cas,” He started, strumming on his guitar, a low, sad sound that made Cas think of his family. “What brings you to New York? Downtown, no less.” He adds with a wink.

 

Cas shivers slightly, only now remembering that he was donned in nothing but his t-shirt and sweat pants, and in the newly fallen Christmas snow nonetheless, while Dean, opposite him, wore dark blue frayed jeans and a plaid flannel under a leather jacket. “Uh… nothing, too much, I guess. I…” Cas stopped. Was this too much to be randomly dumping on a stranger in the middle of the night? Based on the concerned look on Dean’s face, Castiel’s mind said yes while his heart said no. “I lost my job, back in Philly. I was there, with family, kind of. I just needed a fresh start, I guess. And I've always loved the city, so I figured this would be… a good place to kind of get a firm start.”

 

Dean nods thoughtfully, staring off the porch and into the night, as he began to play more chords, almost forming a sort of melody. “Sorry about the job.” He comments, Cas nodding in return. “I get what you mean about the city life. I like the contrast. I like the busy day, how much their is to do.” Dean played another long, low chord. “But I like how quiet the night is. It’s nice.”

 

Castiel nodded. It was true - while the night was beginning to grow quite cold, it was beautiful out - the moon was high, and the stars were twinkling light years away.

 

Dean turned back to Cas, with a wolfish grin on his face. “Anything you want me to play?” He nodded as Cas’ shirt. “I can’t say I’m good enough to shred some Metallica but, you know…”

 

Cas sputtered. “N-no, it’s just an old - old thing. Don’t, uh, you know-”

 

With a laugh, Dean interrupts him. “Relax, Cas, I’m just joking. Do you actually have a song you want me to play?”

 

Cas furrowed his brows for a moment, drawing blanks on songs that he could request without seeming like an idiot, until a title popped into his head, one that he hadn't heard in a long time. “Uh… d’you know Can’t Find My Way Home? By Blind Faith?”

 

Dean snorted, throwing his head back as if he had a lions mane. “Hell yes.”

 

And another moment he was playing.

 

And Cas’ eyes moved to the clear night sky, and back to Dean’s face.

 

_Come down off your throne and leave your body alone_   
_Somebody must change_   
_You are the reason I've been waiting so long_   
_Somebody holds the key_   
_Well, I'm near the end and I just ain't got the time_   
_And I'm wasted and I can't find my way home_

 

He listened to Dean playing, each note on the acoustic guitar sliding out too perfect to be real, too real to be perfect.

 

Cas felt like he could find his way home. No - he felt like he had found his way home.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading, I hope you enjoyed! The next chapter will be out in the next week and depending on the progress this fic might receive updates every Sunday.
> 
> Again, thanks for reading, see you next chapter! Please comment, kudo, bookmark, etc.
> 
> (Note: Song is called Can't Find My Way Home by Blind Faith. Yes, this was the song played in the Season Nine finale episode along with the episode in Season One involving Cassie, the girl who dates Dean.)
> 
> (Another Note: Yes, Lucy and his father is supposed to be a joke. Get it? Lucifer and God? Yeah, sorry, I'm not funny.)


End file.
